If your Dubai project has exposed structural steel, passive fire protection is not optional. The UAE Fire and Life Safety Code of Practice, issued by the General Command of Civil Defence, requires that fire protection materials used on buildings are listed, approved and registered with Civil Defence before they go on site. This guide explains how that works for intumescent coatings, and what to check before you buy.
What an intumescent coating does
An intumescent coating looks like a normal paint film at everyday temperatures. In a fire, from roughly 200 degrees Celsius, the film reacts and expands into a thick insulating char, many times its original thickness. That char slows the heating of the steel underneath. This matters because structural steel begins losing strength from around 300 degrees Celsius, and design codes assume the section keeps its load bearing capacity for a stated fire resistance period.
What the UAE code asks for
The current UAE Fire and Life Safety Code, in force since the 2018 edition, sets minimum fire resistance ratings based mainly on three factors: building height, occupancy type and risk. Higher buildings and higher risk occupancies need longer ratings, and certain high risk cases require a minimum of 2 hours regardless of height. Typical structural ratings specified in Dubai projects are 60, 90 or 120 minutes.
Two practical consequences follow. First, the intumescent product itself must carry recognised fire test evidence, commonly to BS 476 Part 21 or EN 13381 Part 8 for cellulosic fires, and must be registered with Civil Defence. Second, the applied thickness is not one number. It comes from the manufacturer's loading tables, which give a required dry film thickness for each steel section factor, usually written as Hp/A or A/V, at the target rating.
How thickness schedules are built
A light, open steel section heats up faster than a heavy compact one, so it needs more coating. The section factor captures this. A consultant or the coating supplier takes the steel schedule, computes the section factor per member, then reads the certified loading table to produce a member by member thickness schedule. Expect thin film intumescents to run from a few hundred microns up to several millimetres of dry film at 120 minutes on light sections.
What to check before you order in Dubai
Ask the supplier for four things: the fire test certificate matching your required rating, the Civil Defence registration status, the loading tables for your steel sections, and the compatible primer and topseal system. A certified coating applied over the wrong primer, or without the topseal needed in humid or exterior exposure, can fail inspection. Dubai's coastal humidity makes the approved system build up genuinely important, not paperwork.
MENA Industrial Supplies stocks thin film intumescent coatings for 30 to 120 minute cellulosic ratings and epoxy passive fire protection for hydrocarbon environments, with documentation support for consultant and Civil Defence submissions. Call +971 4 832 44 22 for a same day quotation with the certificates included.